


It's over

by resonae



Category: Mission: Impossible - Ghost Protocol (2011), S.W.A.T. (2003)
Genre: Bullying, Child Abuse, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-03-02
Updated: 2013-03-02
Packaged: 2017-12-04 03:06:12
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,576
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/705797
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/resonae/pseuds/resonae
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>No one knew this, but Will was abused as a child.</p>
            </blockquote>





	It's over

No one knew this, but Will was abused as a child.

 

It’s something Will kept fiercely hidden. When he was young, maybe 3, 4, he’d thought it was normal that his dad came home drunk and hit him, and he’d thought it was normal his mother would get high and beat him. He didn’t go to kindergarten, but he did go to elementary school. He didn’t bother hiding his bruises, but his parents only hit him where no one saw.

 

He didn’t realize that something was wrong until he got into middle school, learned about domestic violence, and that no, it wasn’t actually normal for your dad to come at you with broken beer bottles and for your mom to stub on cigarettes on your back. He was a lot more self-conscious of himself after that, scared someone would find out and take him away. He didn’t hate his parents. He hated that it hurt when they cut him or beat him or bruised him, but they were his parents. He took jobs, working under minimum wage in not-so-legal places that hired 13 year olds to take out trash and do heavy lifting.  His parents took the money to buy more alcohol and more drugs, but that was okay. Will got to save up little by little, buying himself new notebooks and pencils so he could keep up in school.

 

He was never social, but teachers loved him because he was a hardworking, brilliant student. He never had any friends and the other kids called him _loser_ and _nerd_ , but that was okay.

 

He managed to test into all the honor classes in high school, and teachers loved him even more. The bullying went from passive to aggressive, where jocks would purposely hide his notebooks, make fun of him because he used regular pencils instead of fancy mechanical pencils or pens, and tore his books apart and planted stink bombs in his locker.

 

Thankfully, the librarian liked him immensely, and she let him use the tape in the library to take his books back up. She looked sad when she sent him back home and gave him a bag of cookies. He hid the cookies in his bag, but his mom found out about them anyway and he never got to taste them.

 

The bullying got worse and worse, and his parents got worse and worse, but Will endured it all quietly, crying by himself on his broken mess of a bed if it got too bad. He was physically and mentally exhausted, having to haul himself back and forth from school and work and home. But at least now he was in high school, he was able to get working papers and get a legitimate job. It was safe, his boss liked him immensely, and Will got 10 dollars an hour to sit at a desk and file papers. Sometimes, if there was little work, his boss told him it was okay to study at his desk until his shift was over, because Will was such a hard worker and he never made mistakes.

 

In his sophomore year, Will met Jim Street, and Jim changed his life. Jim was the star of the football team, the dream boy of all girls, rich, and nice to boot. Will knew Jim was nice because he was one of the jocks that never bullied him.

 

Will was always careful changing for gym, because his torso was a mess of cuts and bruises and burns. He always changed in the bathroom of the locker rooms and he always wore long track pants instead of the shorts so no one could see his legs. But one day he was almost late, and he figured it was okay to change in the locker room because no one was there anyway.

 

He was wrong.

 

“Holy shit,” he heard, and he froze. He couldn’t move, but he heard the footsteps coming near him, and when he finally turned, Jim Street was there, looking at his bare back. “Holy – did are the guys doing this to you?” Will was so scared he only stared, and Jim cleared his throat. “The football team guys.” Jim’s voice was gentle. “Did they do this?” Will shook his head, and Jim frowned. “Then who… wait, you know what? Put your shirt on, come with me.” Jim took Will’s wrist in his hand and pulled him along.

 

Jim told the instructor that Will wasn’t feeling well, and since Jim and Will were good kids who never skipped class, and partly probably because Will knew he was pale and shaking and looked sick, he told Jim to take Will to the nurse.

 

Jim had interrogated Will until Will was crying, a confession spilling out of his lips before he could stop it. Jim had listened, holding Will’s hands in his, tight-lipped and looking furious until Will was done. “I’ll take care of it.” He said, when Will had said he didn’t want his parents to be taken away. “You let me take care of it, Will.”

 

And Jim did. Jim went home with Will that day, and Will had never been embarrassed about his parents, but he had been that day when Jim stood in between Will and his high mother and drunk father. When his father angrily raised his beer bottle, Jim blocked it calmly and swept his father’s feet under himself. “I’m going to be coming home with Will every day from now on.” Jim told them. “I’m going to protect him from you.”

 

Will met Jim’s parents, who loved Will. “So much better than those football boys you bring, Jimmy.” Jim’s mother giggled, and she was so beautiful in a way Will’s mother never had been. She told Will he was too thin, fed him food he’d never tasted before, and didn’t judge him by his fraying clothes or his too-short pencils. Jim’s father was loud and friendly and treated Will like a son.

 

Jim had football practice while Will had work, but Jim was always grinning and waiting for him when Will came down the stairs of the building. He always went home with Will, stared angrily at his parents, and kept guard over Will anytime something happened. Since he couldn’t always be with Will, he had Will’s door fixed, and equipped it with a heavy lock. “Maybe they’ll break it down,” Jim had said, looking satisfied at the door that looked hilariously out of place in the broken-down apartment, “but you’ll have time to run. And call me, I’ll come find you.”

 

Will had a cell phone for the first time in his life. It was way too high tech and way too expensive, but Jim had waved it off. “How else would I contact you,” Jim had said, “if something happened?” He had three numbers in the phone. Jim, Jim’s mother, and Jim’s father.

 

Will spent his Christmas of his Junior year at Jim’s. Jim’s parents got him a new backpack, a set of mechanical pencils and expensive looking stationary, and a brand new laptop for Christmas. He had stared at the laptop and he felt so hideously outclassed.

 

But Jim’s mother said, “Oh, honey,” when she opened the present he’d bought with the money he’d saved up for so long and with the generous Christmas bonus his boss had given him. “Oh, honey, these are so beautiful.” They weren’t, Will had thought. They were little gold earrings with rubies on them, but when Jim’s mother put them on, they looked like they cost a million dollars. He felt a little better.

 

Jim’s dad opened his present and couldn’t help his smile, and he was so genuinely happy about the leather golf gloves that Will had so painstakingly picked out that Will kept the sinking feeling in his gut go away. “These are perfect, just perfect.”

 

But the best part was when Jim opened his present. “Holy _shit_!”

 

“Jimmy!” Jim’s mother said. “Language.”

 

Jim looked wide-eyed at the football in front of him, signed by Jerry Rice of the 49ers. “I- Is it okay?” Will asked nervously. “I didn’t know if you liked him or not, but you have a poster in your room, and you play football, and one of the ladies at work said she could get me one and-” He trailed off when Jim didn’t respond. “I- I can get you something else.”

 

“No fucking way.” ( _“Jim!”_ ) Jim held up the football as if it was the holiest thing he’d seen.  “This is _perfect_.” And Jim smiled so brilliantly at him that Will couldn’t help but smile shyly back.

 

For the first time in his life, Will slept over at someone else’s house. Jim’s mom and dad kept peeking in, trying to see what Jim had gotten for Will (“I’m going to give it to him in private, duh,” Jim had said,), until Jim got so annoyed that he locked the door and Will couldn’t help but laugh at everything. Jim had propped the football on a stand Will got for him along with the football.

 

“Can I see?” Jim said quietly, and Will got the sinking feeling again. “Let me see.” Jim hadn’t seen how Will was at all since the last year, and Will had healed considerably without constant abuse. But now that he was no longer bruised black and blue, his cuts and burns were more visible. Jim pushed his shirt up patiently, tracing over every healed cut and burn scars that would never fade.

 

Will didn’t know how it happened, but he found himself on the bed, Jim kissing him gently all the while. He lost his virginity that night. When he woke up the next morning, Jim kissed his nose. The sheets were heavenly around his naked body, and Jim handed him a small, wrapped box. “I was going to give it to you yesterday.” Jim said, sheepishly. “But I.. uh, got carried away. Open it.” Jim slid his arm under Will so he could cradle Will to him as Will opened the box.

 

There was a ring in it. It looked expensive, and Will stared. “It’s not too expensive.” Jim says quickly. “I mean, a little bit, but you know, not too much. I’ll have you know that I bought it with the savings I had from my part-time last summer, not from my parents’ money.” Will remembered the part time. He hadn’t understood why Jim had taken it, but Jim had stubbornly done it. Jim’s parents had been delighted that their son was starting to show responsibility and had urged him on. “It’s white gold. I didn’t want to get you anything fancy, cause you’re not a girl and that’s just weird, but – but look.” Jim showed Will his right hand. The same ring shone on the ring finger. “Take it, Will.”

 

Will did, and it was the happiest day of his life. When they go down for breakfast, Jim’s dad smirked at him like he knew exactly what happened, and Jim’s mom was all giggles. Jim told them they needed to have a serious talk after breakfast.

 

When the talk was done, Jim’s mom had clung onto Will and cried, and Jim’s dad looked furious as Jim pulled Will’s shirt up and showed them the cuts and burns. Jim held Will as Jim’s dad called the police, reported child abuse. The investigations took over a week with the police questioning Will on things he never wanted to say again.

 

It wasn’t too surprising, Will thought, that he moved in with Jim. Sadly, the happiness doesn’t last. Will had always thought he’d be with Jim forever, with the Streets forever.

 

Jim’s parents pass away in their Senior year through a hit-and-run. Jim tried to stay strong for both of them, because he’d always been the one that Will leaned on. When Will received his acceptance to Harvard and decided to throw it out to attend UC Berkeley with Jim instead, Jim convinced him otherwise. “I’ll go to Boston College. I got in there. I don’t want you to give up something like Harvard for me.” But Will didn’t  know if he could stand school without Jim. “You won’t have to.” Jim said, kissing his lips softly. “We’ll get off-campus housing together. It’ll be just like high school, where you attend all the smart classes. I’ll pick you up after school.”

 

But Jim lost the battle against his grief. About three weeks later, Will came back home from work and found Jim dead asleep in their room, a tear-stained note clutched in his palm and an empty sleeping pill bottle rolling around. _Sorry_ , the note read. _I’m so sorry._

 

Will inherited the Streets’ fortune, the house, the car, everything. Will sold the cars, shoved the money into a bank account, and gathered everything he had into a bag to leave for the east coast. He couldn’t bring himself to sell the house. It meant too much to him.

 

He graduated from Harvard with the highest marks, then went to Harvard Law School, where he got the highest grades. He never loved anyone ever again.

 

\--

 

One of the reasons Croatia hit him so badly was because of the failure, the knowledge that _he could have done something but he didn’t_. Just like how Jim had died.

 

Will became Brandt – he didn’t want to get closer to anyone else. He worked ruthlessly efficiently as an analyst and as a field agent, and when Croatia happened, he left the field agent part entirely and quickly worked his way up to be the Chief Analyst.

 

He’d thought that would be it, just the end of it, but then the Secretary told him they were going to Russia to meet Ethan Hunt. Knowing it was going to happen made nothing different. But thankfully Will had enough clusterfucks in his life to keep an entirely straight face. The entire day went to havoc, and Will wondered when his life will ever be normal.

 

Not anytime soon, apparently, because after that he watched Ethan climb the Burj Khalifa, and then caught him on his way down to death. Then he’d used magnets go travel inside a supercomputer, almost got cooked alive in it, then saved the world from nuclear war.

 

Just when he thought things had finally calmed down and he could go back to being as normal as the Chief Analyst of IMF could have, Ethan told him. Everything.

 

He was so relieved that Julia was alive, but when that relief wore off, he was furious. At Ethan, at the Secretary, at Julia. He would never trust Ethan ever again.

 

\--

 

But he did stay on the team, because for what it was worth, they worked incredibly well with each other. And he trusted Jane and Benji. In fact, he trusted Jane and Benji so much that he stopped going over the paperwork if Jane or Benji had already done it. He always checked it over if Ethan had done it, but Jane and Benji hadn’t given him a reason to stop trusting them yet.

 

He realized, as he sat with his heart hammering in his chest, gagged, and tied to a chair, that it wasn’t Benji’s fault that he’d missed the trigger. Benji – or anyone else in IMF – knew about his past, so how would they know what to look for?

 

But Will was staring face-to-face with his parents. He was sure of that. And they’d shot him through the leg, kidnapped him, and had gagged and tied them up. Will knew his mother was 16 and his father 17 when they had him. Since he was 35, his mother would be 51 and his father 52.

 

They looked like they were 70, with skin as wrinkled as raisins and littered with track marks. Their teeth were yellow, half gone. But his father was inhumanely strong when he grabbed Will’s cheek and forced it up. Drugs, Will realized. Some kind of steroids, maybe. “Feel good now, kid?” His father hissed. “Felt good when you sold us out for that rich motherfuckers?”

 

They spit poison at him, gripping painfully into his hair and Will wanted to break down and cry. He whimpered through the gag, and his mother punched his shot leg. Will screamed. “You want Jim, don’t you?” She cackled. “That fag died because of you, you know that? We got to him when you were out. Told him he could kill himself, or we could go shoot you through the head.”

 

Will froze. Jim committed suicide, he wanted to yell. His father hit him on the side of the head with the pistol. “He told us all this shit, threatened to call the police. We told him we’d shoot him and then go shoot you. Much more fun than killing his fucker parents.”

 

Will moaned in anguish. _Nonono_ _they died in an accident nononono_. “They died because of you.” His mother cocked the gun again, and Will screamed as fire burst through his injured leg. “You little fucker. Had a nice little rich life while we were rotting in prison, did you? Where the fuck is the money?”

 

Will wanted to cry. The _money_. Of course that would be what this was be all about. You’re my parents, Will thought desperately, his heart breaking. You’re supposed to want the best for me.

 

\--

 

He didn’t know how long he had been unconscious, lost in his own desperation, but when he came to he was vaguely aware of strong arms around him and overly familiar cologne. “We’ve got you.” Ethan said, gingerly easing Will off the chair. “We’ve got you, Brandt. You’re going to be fine.” Okay, Will thought, letting his consciousness drift again. Okay.

 

Later when Will woke up, he found out that he’d only been captured for about 2 hours. His captors – biological parents – had more or less stopped the blood flow from his leg wound by stuffing a rough cloth into the wound (because they needed him to get the money, but apparently they hadn’t thought about infection settling in). He found out that Jane had shot them both when they tried to shoot Will again. He found out he’d been asleep for 10 days, battling heavy infection and blood loss.

 

But when he woke up, he felt permanently broken. His parents had killed the three most important people in his life, just for – just for _money_. He couldn’t deal with the pain. He resigned all of his positions in the IMF and flew back to California.

 

The house was dusty, but he’d apparently forgotten to cancel the bills because when he tested the lights and water, they ran flawlessly. Even internet worked. He couldn’t bring himself to open the door to his and Jim’s old room, so he crawled under the covers in the master bedroom.

 

He slept better than he had ever in the last 19 years of his life. He didn’t wake up until well past noon, and he stayed in bed anyway just because he could. He didn’t get up until about 2.

 

The first thing he did was dial someone who he hadn’t talked to in 19 years. He bit his lip, hoping that the man hadn’t changed his number. The dial tone rang 3 times before the phone was picked up by a warm voice, aged but still the same as Will remembered from so long ago. [Yes, Joseph Glory speaking.] Will found himself unable to speak, overcome by emotion. [Hello?]

 

“U-uncle Joe.” He managed to whisper, tears threatening to spill. He was met by silence. Will’s teeth chattered. “It’s me, Uncle Joe. It’s-“

 

[William.] The other man breathed. [Oh, William. I never – I hoped this day would come, always. Every day I hoped you would call; I never changed my number hoping one day… Where are you, William? Please tell me I can see you again.]

 

Will looked around. “I’m – I’m back at home, actually.” He laughed emptily. It felt so right, to call this place his _home_ , even though he’d lived in it for about 3 years.

 

[Yes. Yes, of course. Stay. Stay, William, stay there. Don’t go anywhere. I’ll be there in 20 minutes, tops. Don’t leave, William.]

 

No, Uncle Joe. William thought. I’m not leaving again.

 

\--

 

Joseph Glory was one of Nicole Street and Jonathan Street’s closest friends – and their personal lawyer. He’d warmed up to William immediately, and insisted Will call him Uncle Joe just as Jim did. When Nicole and Jonathan officially became Will’s adopted parents, they listed Joseph Glory as his godfather, as Joseph’s own request.

 

It was Joseph who taught Will and Jim how to find the legal loopholes in almost every contract and law (it had horrified Nicole and amused Jonathan), and it was Joseph who had acted as a standing parent after Nicole and Jonathan passed away.

 

Uncle Joe cried when he came rushing to the house and Will opened the door, and they talked for hours, Will curled up on the big couch and Uncle Joe reclining on the sofa.

 

As he left, Uncle Joe took out a thick envelope from his bag. “Everything they had belong to you, Will. You never looked at it all, did you?” No, Will had not. He felt sick thinking about it. Uncle Joe smiled sadly, patted his shoulder and handed Will the envelope. “They’re in a good place, Will. You don’t have to have survivor’s guilt.”

 

\--

 

It took Ethan, Jane, and Benji fifteen days to track Will down, and Will guessed that was just courtesy to let Will have some space. He was expecting them to show up, so he wasn’t surprised when he opened the door one day and they were there. Benji rushed in and started ogling everything, Jane looked a little sad, and Ethan looked angry.

 

He offered them no reason, just a place to stay and food. He’d locked the door to his and Jim’s old room, but when he woke up at night, he did it because he expected Ethan to have broken inside. “It’s not nice manners, you know.” Will said, leaning on the door of the dim room. “Doors are locked for a reason.”

 

Ethan was standing in the middle of the room, not touching anything – merely observing everything. “Sometimes you need the doors forced open.” He said. “Looks like you haven’t been in here in a long, long time.” Before Will could sneer a reply at him, Ethan continued on. “Nicole Street, Jonathan Street. I never looked into it before, why your last name was different than your parents ,but the three of us dug into everything about you for the past 15 days.”

 

Will snorted. “I suspect you didn’t find much.”

 

Ethan nodded slowly. “You hid everything from your past.” Will said nothing. “I would apologize for digging into it, but you left us without any sort of explanation. Didn’t even tell us in person. So we felt we should look for the answer ourselves.” Again, Will said nothing. “You got rid of almost everything. But your old high school has paper records of all your grades that listed Anna Williams and Peter Brandt as your parents for the first three years, and then changes to Nicole and Jonathan Street for the senior year. You were adopted. When you were 15.”

 

Will walked past Ethan. There was a fine layer of dust in everything, including the football that never changed. He traced his finger on the signature, fighting back the choking tears that fought its way up. Ethan was suddenly next to him, gingerly swiping away the dust. “Jerry Rice.” Ethan said. “Impressive. Were you a fan?”

 

Will thumbed the still-new football. “No.” He said, smiling sadly. “It wasn’t mine.”

 

“This is your room, though.”

 

Will frowned as he turned toward Ethan. “How can you tell?”

 

Ethan rolled his eyes. “Plaques on the wall, under your name. You were quite a student, huh?” Will followed Ethan’s gaze and couldn’t help but smile bitterly. All of Jim’s football trophies were in the living room, but his awards were all in their room. He remembered Jim and Nicole fighting to have the awards displayed where, but in the end Jim had won out and all of Will’s went on their wall. “So if that’s not yours, whose was it?”

 

“Jim.” Will whispered, his fingers tracing the surface of the football. “And mine.”

 

Ethan mulled that over. “Jim. He was your foster brother.”

 

Will smiled sadly. “Yeah.”

 

His answer was met in silence for a while as Ethan looked around the room, no doubt finding traces of Will and Jim all over the room. “You shared a room, but this house is huge enough that you could have had three rooms for yourself.” Ethan said quietly, his hand dusting off the textbooks. “Why did you share a room?”

 

Will didn’t respond. He instead slid open the top drawer of the open and nodded for Ethan to come closer. “On the day Jim – the day he died, I left these here.” He slid down onto the floor, leaning back onto the bed. He fumbled with the clasp of the small box for a second, but it slid open easily and the two rings greeted him. Ethan stared, and Will didn’t realize he was crying until Ethan reached up and gently thumbed his cheeks.

 

“You two were in love.” Ethan said softly. He looked at Will for permission before he took out the rings.

 

Will took one from his palm and rolled it between his fingers. “He protected me from my parents, when he found out they were abusive. He was everything to me.” Will let his tears flow, and Ethan wordlessly wiped them away. “The people who kidnapped me… they were my biological parents. I found out they killed Jim’s parents, and then Jim.”

 

“They were trying to rile you up.” Ethan spoke softly.

 

“No.” Will looked at the ring in his hands. “They were telling the truth. It never made sense to me. Why Jim would just.. leave. He’d been the strong one. If anything, he was always scared that I’d be the one he’d find dead one day. He’d never leave me.” Will put the ring back in the box. “I was a weak little thing back then. Always bullied. All the time.”

 

Ethan nodded. “That was in the data. You were underweight.”

 

“Almost to the point of anorexia.” Will nodded. “They worried about me all the time. Tried to get me to eat more and more. But it wasn’t that the food tasted bad or anything. I just didn’t have an appetite. But that’s beside the point. The point is, they were my parents. And…”

 

Ethan cut him off. “They weren’t your parents.” When Will frowned, he held up his hand. “They gave birth to you, yes. But they weren’t your parents. Your parents were these people. Jonathan and Nicole Street. They loved you. That I can tell without data. When you talk about them, your expression… it changes. I just can tell.”

 

Will smiled sadly. “Yeah. And they died because of me. I couldn’t – that was it. There was Julia, who died because of me. Don’t say Julia didn’t die. In a regular situation, she’d be dead. Then there were my.. my parents. And then Jim. So many people are dying because of me. I can’t stand that anymore.”

 

“How about all the people you saved?”

 

Will chuckled humorlessly. “That won’t stop me, Ethan. I’m done.”

 


End file.
